Bibliographic details of the publications referred to in this specification are collected at the end of the description.
The subject specification contains nucleotide and amino acid sequence information prepared using the programme PatentIn Version 2.0, presented herein after the bibliography. Each nucleotide or amino acid sequence is identified in the sequence listing by the numeric indicator <210> followed by the sequence identifier (e.g. <210>1, <210>2, etc). The length, type of sequence (DNA, protein (PRT), etc) and source organism for each nucleotide or amino acid sequence are indicated by information provided in the numeric indicator fields <211>, <212> and <213>, respectively. Nucleotide and amino acid sequences referred to in the specification are defined by their sequence identifier (e.g. SEQ ID NO:1, SEQ ID NO:2, etc).
The designation of nucleotide residues referred to herein are those recommended by the IUPAC-IUB Biochemical Nomenclature Commission, wherein A represents Adenine, C represents Cytosine, G represents Guanine, T represents Thymine, Y represents a pyrimidine residue, R represents a purine residue, M represents Adenine or Cytosine, K represents Guanine or Thymine, S represents Guanine or Cytosine, W represents Adenine or Thymine, H represents a nucleotide other than Guanine, B represents a nucleotide other than Adenine, V represents a nucleotide other than Thymine, D represents a nucleotide other than Cytosine and N represents any nucleotide residue.
The rapidly increasing sophistication of recombinant DNA technology is greatly facilitating research and development of a range of biotechnologically-related industries. This is particularly the case in the horticultural, agricultural and plant industries. Substantial progress, for example, has been achieved in the genetic development of plant varieties exhibiting new or improved traits such as disease resistance, enhanced nutritional properties, greater tolerance to adverse environmental conditions and altered flower colour. However, progress in the genetic manipulation of some plants has been hampered by the lack of sufficient effective promoters and/or the lack of promoters capable of being induced by commercially inexpensive and useful effector stimuli. Furthermore, more promoters are required to facilitate expression of multiple traits in a target species. There is a need, therefore, to identify new promoters and to identify and characterize effector molecules and stimuli which are capable of inducing these promoters. There is also a need to identify promoters which are capable of directing constitutive expression.
Plants are subject to a variety of environmental and mechanical stimuli including stress. Although mechanical stress has been postulated to involve ethylene-mediated meristem morphogenesis (Selker et al., 1992), little is known about how mechanical stress induces ethylene production or the signal transduction process involved.
In work leading to the present invention, the inventors sought to identify and isolate promoters involved in mechanical stress-induced expression of genetic traits in Vigna radiata (mung bean). Mung bean plants are a useful model for physical and chemical induction of phenotypic expression of genetic traits due to their morphology, rapid growth rate and the ability to obtain a large number of uniform plants and, therefore, sufficient amounts of tissues to conduct analyses.
In accordance with the present invention, the inventors have isolated a promoter capable of induction following physical stimulus in cells in which the promoter is indigenous, i.e., cells of mung bean plants. The promoter is also capable of being induced by a range of chemical and other environmental stimuli. However, in cells in which the promoter is non-indigenous, the promoter is constitutively expressed. The promoter of the present invention is useful in the genetic manipulation of plants.